Democrats

Republican running mate Paul Ryan criticized Democrats Wednesday for having "purged" the word "God" from their official platform, calling the move "peculiar" as Democrats downplayed the omission.

"I think it's rather peculiar. It's not in keeping with our founding documents, our founding vision, but I guess you'd have to ask the Obama administration why they purged all this language from their platform," Ryan said in an interview with Fox News.

He was among several conservatives complaining after the official party platform was adopted late Tuesday at the Democratic convention in Charlotte, N.C.

The Democrats' 2008 platform, like platforms before it, included the word "God"...

Democrats at the 2012 Democratic National Convention are set to approve a platform today that is unambiguously pro-abortion and opposes any effort whatsoever to stop any abortions. The platform also calls on forcing Americans to pay for abortions at taxpayer expense.

The platform Democrats will approve rejects efforts to stop forcing taxpayers to fund Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion business and supports the Obama HHS mandate that forces religious groups to pay for and refer women for abortion-causing drugs under Obamacare.

Democrats also support Roe v. Wade and its 40-year legacy of 55 million abortions, and President Obama’s decision to strike the Mexico City Policy, which President George W. Bush put in place to protect taxpayers from having to fund groups that promote or perform abortions overseas. Unlike the Republican platform, Democrats say nothing about China’s one-child policy that includes forced abortions...

House lawmakers voted Wednesday to repeal the federal health care overhaul -- the latest in a long line of anti-"ObamaCare" votes, but the first since the Supreme Court upheld the law and defined one of its key provisions as a "tax."

The House has voted more than 30 times to scrap, defund or undercut the law since Obama signed it in March 2010. As with those bills, the repeal bill approved Wednesday on a 244-185 vote faces certain demise in the Democrat-controlled Senate.

But Republicans were looking to get lawmakers back on record on the law in the wake of the high court ruling last month. The ruling upheld most the law as constitutional, but in doing so determined that the controversial penalty on those who do not buy insurance technically qualifies as a "tax" and not a "penalty" as the administration had claimed. That definition fueled GOP criticism of the law, and put some Democrats in a politically tricky position...

The Obama campaign and Washington Democrats appeared unwilling Wednesday to walk away from their failed effort to recall Wisconsin GOP Gov. Scott Walker, even after their candidate suggested everyone move forward.

“While the results of the governor's race were not what we had hoped for, we were still able to overcome great challenges to ensure the voices of middle-class families were heard,” said Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

“Over the past year, Wisconsin Democrats have taken on the immense challenge of … fighting against government overreach and ensuring voters have a say about the future of the state,” she said.

The failed recall effort was led by Democrats who though Walker and Republicans in the state legislature rolled back what they considered excesses in the collective bargaining agreements of public-employee unions -- an effort to cut Wisconsin’s estimated $3.6 billion budget shortfall...

Five months before Election Day, you'd think there would be no better harbinger about who will win the White House than a contentious statewide vote in a critical battleground state that never moved on from the 2010 campaign.

You'd be wrong.

Yes, there will be tea leaves to read after Wisconsin voters decide Tuesday whether to recall rookie Republican Gov. Scott Walker, a tea party-supported GOP hero who might be the only politician in America to rival President Barack Obama in contentious achievement that inspires loathing among opponents...

Democrats in the House of Representatives prevented passage of a bill that would ban sex-selection abortions. The legislation needed a two-thirds vote and Democrats voted overwhelmingly against the legislation after President Barack Obama and Planned Parenthood came out in opposition.

With a 246-168 vote, the bill did not obtain the two-thirds majority necessary to pass. Republicans voted for the bill on a 226-7 margin while Democrats opposed banning sex-selection abortions on 161-20 vote margin.

The bill would make it a federal offense to knowingly do any one of the following four things: (1) perform an abortion, at any time in pregnancy, “knowing that such abortion is sought based on the sex or gender of the child”; (2) use “force or threat of force. . . for the purpose of coercing a sex-selection abortion”; (3) solicit or accept funds to perform a sex-selection abortion; or (4) transport a woman into the U.S. or across state lines for this purpose.

With less than two weeks to go until the recall election -- and with recent polls showing Walker leading Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett -- DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz on Wednesday issued an email appeal:

"It's up to Democrats across the country to help win this thing," she wrote. "Winning in Wisconsin sends a powerful message to the far-right extremists, and it starts to roll back their worst offenses.

President Obama today announced that he now supports same-sex marriage, reversing his longstanding opposition amid growing pressure from the Democratic base and even his own vice president.

In an interview with ABC News’ Robin Roberts, the president described his thought process as an “evolution” that led him to this place, based on conversations with his own staff members, openly gay and lesbian service members, and conversations with his wife and own daughters.

"I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I have talked to friends and family and neighbors when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together, when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that Don't Ask Don't Tell is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I’

A decade ago, Americans felt similarly about their local, state and federal governments. No longer.

Today, just one in three has a favorable view of the federal government — the lowest level in 15 years, according to a Pew survey. The majority of Americans remain satisfied with their local and state governments — 61 percent and 52 percent, respectively — but only 33 percent feel likewise about the federal government.

In 2002, nearly double that figure, 64 percent, viewed the federal government favorably, and Americans held their local and state governments in similar esteem, at 67 percent and 62 percent, respectively.

There’s the expected partisan gap: A majority of Democrats, 51 percent, view the Obama-led government favorably, compared to 27 percent of independents and 20 percent of Republicans.

A large majority of American voters think gas prices pose a serious threat to the nation’s economic recovery. In addition, voters are sharply divided over whether President Obama could do more to bring down gas prices -- or whether he even wants gas prices to go down.

Nearly half of voters, 47 percent, say high gas prices pose an “extremely” serious threat to the economy, according to a Fox News poll released Monday. Another 40 percent consider it a “somewhat” serious threat.

Sixty percent of Republicans think high prices at the pump are an “extremely” serious threat to economic recovery. That’s nearly twice as many as the 33 percent of Democrats who think so...